


Ways and Means

by Potterology



Category: Luther (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-01
Updated: 2013-10-01
Packaged: 2017-12-28 02:57:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/986848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Potterology/pseuds/Potterology
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John goes down for murdering Zoe. He gets a visitor. "They think her mad or sad, or both, and dismiss her wrongness as a trick of the eye. " Prev. posted on ff.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ways and Means

How she does it, he is doomed to never know. What he does know, however, is how to mask his deep surprise when the guard escorts him from his eight by ten prison cell upon informing him that his 'wife' is here to see him. His wife is dead, has been dead for a year, and if there's one thing the guard should know, it's that John is in prison for supposedly murdering her. And yet.

They lead him to a private little room with a window and two doors, one with bars across it, one without. He is not handcuffed but his escort rests his hand on his baton and grips it hard. John shouldn't know who's walking in through the door, shouldn't be here in the first place, but he does and is, so he prepares himself for the vibrant red hair and equally painted lips. She does not disappoint.

Everything about her is familiar. Clean, neat, possessing a sense of togetherness most people do not, and he supposes it is her mentality which sets her apart. Her unwillingness to fall for the great lie of the universe: that people are anything more than simple matter.

Tearfully - oh, he remembers those looks; she has become so much better at feigning upset compared to their first meeting, it's as close to genuine as she might have ever come - she turns to the guards and asks for privacy.

"It's been so long since we had a chance to talk, I'd much rather we not have company. If that's alright, of course?" John has no doubt it will be. Such vulnerability cannot be told no, not when it's pleading for so little a thing, fluffing up the neanderthal twins' innate sense of masturbatory self-importance. Funny, almost, to watch them sense wickedness under the surface but mistake it for the air of the heavily medicated. They think her mad or sad, or both, and dismiss her wrongness as a trick of the eye. Assuring her they are just outside (as if she needs their protection, cretins) they shuffle out.

"Much better," she sighs, once alone. Her face eases in to sharp lines, her shoulders straighten from their grieving hunch, her hands stop shaking. Watching her drop the act is like watching her slip into hot bathwater: utter relaxation and relief. Her eyes dry as she takes in his blue scrubs, greying hair and slippered feet. "My, my. We are in trouble."

"You'd have been proud." It's funny, how simple it is to forget their surroundings, their opposing circumstances. Sitting sideways on his chair, legs crossed, this might be their first meeting.

"Oh, I am," she whispers. Her smile is delightful. Pure happiness at the thought of him butchering another human being, no matter how much she knows it's not true.

"Why are you here, Alice?"

She gave a small, sad sniff. "I missed you terribly."

"I don't believe you."

"You should. Honestly, it's been murder out there without you." Oh, God, it's thrilling. She is thrilling. "I've been a very busy bee."

"I don't doubt."

"Hm." She smiles, leans forward close enough for him to hear her breathing, just barely. "Isn't this a most bizarre reversal? You, the innocent man behind bars; me, guilty as sin and free to go. I could call those idiots in and have you sent back to your special piece of hell, never to return."

"Don't tempt me with a good time," he replies, matching her low tones. She says nothing for a solid thirty seconds. Are you trying to beguile me? Well, her smile tells him everything.

Only her mouth moves: "Ian Reed is dead."

"Is that what you're here to tell me?"

"Well, I assumed you wouldn't be high on the list of people to inform. It wasn't on the news."

"Did you kill him?"

A bare hint of smile graces her lips, a whispered, "Does it matter?" Echoing a conversation from so long ago.

"Yes." It comes out harder than he intended, their low love letter conversation sharply turning into something closer to an interrogation. Curiously she does not seem vexed; actually, she seems almost bored, which is a new thing for them and dangerous for him.

"Well, I'm afraid you will just have to live with never knowing."

"Alice."

"John." She opens her mouth to say something that she knows will infuriate him to no end, perhaps a titillating detail of how she ripped Ian Reed from life violently and without mercy, however a guard interrupts, informing them time is up and she has to leave.

Before she goes, however, she leans forward and surprises him with a kiss. It's deep and intrusive, not at all how he would have imagined it to be (and he has imagined it a lot) despite her existence in his life being the exact definition of intrusive. Something small and metal is pushed into the side of his mouth by her tongue, which in turn disappears, along with the rest of her, out the door. One of the officers smirks at him.

"Let's go. I'm sure you're just gagging to get back to your cell." John is. But not for the reason he thinks.

It turns out to be a key. For handcuffs. He hides it inside a crack in the plaster.

Two weeks later, his cell door swings open and there she is in a hairnet and scrubs, pushing an industrial laundry basket. Glorious is how he describes her afterwards, the words 'get in' seared into his memory alongside her beatific smile. He winds up in the backseat of a type E Jag, speeding comfortably away from HMP Thameside.

"My, my. Aiding criminals and breaking out of secure facilities? Wouldn't have thought you the type." He grins at her in the rearview mirror.

"There's a first time for everything. Now, be quiet and keep your head down. This is a stolen car."

They drive for a good two hours before swapping the Jag for a transit van containing the majority of his possessions, including a picture of Zoe. There's still a smudge of blood in the top left corner but it's watery, as if someone tried to clean it off and missed while wiping it down.

Alice notices him looking, "I did kill him, by the way. Ian."

"How?"

"Do you really want to know?"

"Yes."

"I slit his throat with a straight razor. I thought about making it look like a suicide and have him confess in a note but things went... sideways. We had words."

He nods appreciatively. Does she know what she's done? He doesn't doubt it, she is the very definition of intelligence, but does she know what it means? To him? For them? He wants to ask her but can't, so he settles on: "So. Now what?"


End file.
